The tale of Sleeping Beauty is one that has been told for generations. From a simple fairytale to a thrilling film courtesy of Walt Disney, Sleeping Beauty has won the hearts of many. The traditional version embarks on a young girl who falls in love with a stranger, but later finds out that she is a princess and betrothed to another. After being presented with new knowledge, she is taken to her castle and pricks her finger on a cursed spinning wheel, falling into a hundred year sleep. Meanwhile, her lover from earlier is revealed to be the prince she is betrothed to, and he finds and gives her true love’s kiss to break the spell, leaving them to live happily ever after. Disney, who has adopted this fable into its family for almost sixty years, looked upon Liz Braswell to retell the story in an unfamiliar way. In her book, Once Upon a Dream, from her ongoing series of Twisted Tales, her question is this: what if the sleeping beauty never woke up? In this interpretation of the classic tale, Aurora is trapped in a dream world, where her life is the complete opposite of doppelganger to her real one. Over the course of the book, her character develops severely, in the cases of her changes as a person, her different archetypes showing through, and the version of this novel compared to the Disney fairytale. Now is the time to awaken into the world of literature.
Princess Aurora, the protagonist of the story, is first viewed in her sleeping-curse state, gazed upon by Prince Phillip.